The Girls of Central High on the Stage; Or, The Play That Took The Prize

“Oh, how mean of him!” exclaimed Mrs. Morse.

“I don’t see how we are going to get it, Mother,” said Jess, worriedly.

“Well, that’s true. But we’ve got another month before we need to cross that bridge.”

That was Mrs. Morse’s way. Perhaps it was as well that she allowed such responsibilities to slip past her like water running off the feathers of a duck.

“And if Mr. Closewick shouldn’t want to—to trust us any longer, Mother?” suggested Jess. That was as near as she could get to telling the good lady what had really happened the night before.

“Why! that would be most mortifying. He won’t do it, though. But if he does, we’ll immediately begin trading elsewhere, I don’t really think Mr. Closewick always gives us good weight, at that!”

Jess could only sigh. It was always the way. Mrs. Morse saw things from a most surprising angle. She was just as honest—intentionally—as she could be, but the ethics of business dealing were not quite straight in her mind.

And something must be done this very day to put food in the larder. What little Jess had brought in from Mr. Vandergriff’s store would not last them over Sunday. And her mother seemed to think that everybody else would be just as sanguine of her getting a check as she was herself.

“I do wish you had been able to get steady work with the Courier,” spoke Jess, as she prepared to go out.

“That would have been nice,” admitted her mother. “And I am in a position to know a good deal of what goes on socially on the Hill. I am welcome in the homes of the very best people, for your father’s sake, Jess. He was a very fine man, indeed.”

“And for your own sake, too, Mamma!” cried Jess, who was really, after all, very proud of her mother’s talent.

“It would have been nice,” repeated Mrs. Morse. “And certainly the Courier is not covering the Hill as well as might be. I pointed that out to Mr. Prentice; but he is limited in expenditures, I suppose, the paper being a new venture.”

It was on the tip of the girl’s tongue to tell her mother of the visit of Mr. Prentice’s sister-in-law the evening before. But why disturb her mother’s mind with all that trouble? So she said nothing, kissed her fondly, and sallied forth to beard in their lairs “the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker.” And, truly, there were few girls in Centerport that day with greater lions in their way than those in the path of Jess Morse.

CHAPTER VII—THE HAND HELD OUT

“Hullo! here’s Short and Long!” cried Bobby, as a very short boy with very brisk legs came sliding down the hill with a big bundle under his arm.

Billy Long was an industrious youngster who only allowed himself leisure to keep up in athletics after school hours, because he liked to earn something toward his family’s support.

“Stop and try a ride, Billy,” urged Lance Darby, holding the cord of the tugging kite.

“Can’t. Going on an errand.”

“Hey, Billy! how’s your dyspepsia?” demanded another of the boys.

Billy grinned. Bobby exclaimed:

“Now, don’t tell me that Short and Long ever has trouble with his digestion—I won’t believe it!”

“He sure had a bad case of it yesterday,” drawled Chet Belding. “At least, so Mr. Sharp said. Billy spelled it with an ‘i’.”

“Let me use your knife a minute, please?” asked Bobby, who was still struggling with a refractory strap. “No! just toss it to me.”

“That’s all right,” returned the small boy, with a grin, as he walked over and carefully handed Bobby the knife. “I don’t take any chances with girls in throwing, or catching. All my sister can do is to throw a fit, or catch a cold!”

“Ow! isn’t that a wicked statement?” cried Bobby. “You know it isn’t so. But you’re right down ignorant, Billy. You’re just as bad as Postscript was in Gee Gee’s class one day this week.”

“Who’s ‘Postscript’?” demanded Lance. “That’s a new one on me.”

“Why,” said Bobby, her black eyes twinkling, “I mean Adeline Moore. That’s a postscript, isn’t it?”

“What happened to Addie?” asked Jess, as the others laughed.

“Why, she got befuddled in reciting something about an Indian uprising that came in our American History hour. It’s all review stuff, you know.

“‘What is it that you call an Indian woman, Adeline?’ Gee Gee asked, real sharp.

“And Addie jumped, and stammered, and finally said:

“‘A squaw, please, Miss Carrington.’

“‘And what do you call her baby, then?’ snapped Gee Gee.

“‘A—a squawker,’ says Addie, and the poor thing got a black mark for it. Wasn’t that mean?”

“Miss Grace G. Carrington was in one of her moods,” observed Chet, when the laugh had subsided.

“She’s subject to moods,” Lance drawled.

“No, she’s not!” cried Bobby Hargrew. “She only had one mood—the imperative—and we girls are all subject to that,” and she sighed, for Bobby was frequently in trouble with the very strict assistant principal of Central High whom she disrespectfully referred to as “Gee Gee.”

Jess and her friend had left the others now and were approaching Market Street. Like everybody else on the walks, they had to be careful how they stepped, and it was with many a laugh and gibe that Bobby Hargrew beguiled the way. Jess, however, was serious once more.

“Are you really going in for that prize Mrs. Kerrick is going to put up for us?” demanded Bobby.

“Do you know what it’s for?”

“No—I haven’t heard that,” said the younger girl. “But for two hundred dollars I’d learn tatting—or darn socks. Daddy says I ought to learn to darn his. What’s it all about, anyway? I suppose Laura knows?”

“Yes. It’s a play. The girl who writes the best one, that can be acted by us boys and girls of Central High, is to get the prize.”

“Gee! won’t that be nuts for Miss Gould?” cried Bobby. “You know, she tried us out in blank verse the other day, and I made a hit. My stately lines were spoken of with commendation. And when she told us to bring in a rhyme, or poetry—whichever we had the courage to call it—I wanted to read mine out loud. But she wouldn’t let me. She said she had not intended to start a school for humorous poets.”

“What did you hand in?” asked Jess, smiling.

“Want to hear it?” cried Bobby, eagerly, digging into her pocket which—like a boy’s—was always filled with a conglomeration of articles. “Listen here!” she added, drawing forth a crumpled paper. “This is called ‘Such is Life’ and really, I was hurt that Miss Gould considered it so lightly,” and she began to read at once:

    “‘William  Wright  was  often  wrong
        And  Thomas  Goode  was  bad;
    While  Griffith  Smiley,  odd  to  state,
        Was  almost  always  sad.
    Jedediah  Rich  was  very  poor,
        While  Ozias  Poor  was  rich,
    And  Eliphalet  Q.  Carpenter
        Earned  his  living  digging  ditch.
    Tom  White  was  black  Jim  Black  was  white,
        And  Jose  Manuel  Green  was  brown;
    While  Ching  Ling  Blu  was  yellow,
        As  was  known  all  over  town!’

“I’d have made more of it,” added Bobby, “only Miss Gould didn’t seem to care for that kind of poetry. And I suppose if I tried my hand at a play that I would be unable to hit the popular taste,” and she sighed.

“I guess they won’t demand verse from us in this play,” giggled Jess. “And that is most atrocious, Bobby.”

“Think so?” returned her friend, her eyes twinkling. “And you’ll do a whole lot better when it comes to writing your own play, I s’pose?”

“It won’t be in verse—blank, or otherwise,” admitted Jess.

“You really are going to try for it?”

“Why, Bobby, I’d love to win that two hundred dollars. I don’t suppose I can. All the girls will try, I expect, and Laura, or Nell Agnew, will get it. But I want that two hundred dollars worse than I ever wanted anything in my life!”

She spoke so earnestly that Bobby was impressed. The latter glanced at her sidewise and a shrewd little smile hovered about her lips for a moment, which Jess did not observe.

“Where are you bound for, Jess?” she asked abruptly.

“Marketing.”

“You trade at Heuffler’s market, don’t you? That’s right around the corner from father’s store. Why don’t you ever patronize our place for groceries. I’m drumming up trade,” said Bobby, grinning.

“I guess our trade wouldn’t amount to much,” said Jess, flushing a little.

“‘Every little bit added to what you’ve got makes just a little bit more,’” quoted Bobby. “And let me tell you, Mr. Thomas Hargrew keeps first-class goods and only asks a fair profit.”

Jess laughed; but she caught at the straw held out to her, too. She knew it would be useless to go to Mr. Closewick’s, where they usually traded. Was it honest to try and obtain credit at another grocery?

“I am afraid your father wouldn’t welcome me as a customer,” said Jess, gravely. “Ours isn’t always a cash trade. Mother’s money comes so very irregular that we have to run a bill at the grocery and the market and other places.”

“Come on and give us a sample order,” urged Bobby. “Father will be glad to get another book account. Now, if you were running a store I’d patronize it! We Central High girls ought to work together—just like a lodge. Come on.”

She fairly dragged Jess by the hand into the store on Market Street, over the door of which Mr. Hargrew’s name was displayed. The clerks were busy at the moment, but Mr. Hargrew was at his desk in the corner. Bobby ran to him and whispered quickly:

“Here she is, Father. You remember what that Mrs. Brown said last night about old Closewick refusing her credit after her mother had traded there so long. And I am sure Jess is in trouble and needs help. Do wait on her, Father.”

“If you say so, Bob,” returned the big man, smiling down upon the girl who, he often said, “was as good as any boy.” “You’ll have to come into this store and share the business when you get older; and you might as well learn to judge customers now. And, if they need help——”

He came out to Jess Morse immediately, smiling and bowing like the suave storekeeper he was.

“Glad to see you, Miss, What can we do for you this morning?”

“Why—why,” stammered Jess, “Bobby urged me to come in; but, really, Mr. Hargrew, it seems like asking a big favor of you, for we have never traded here much.”

“We are always glad to make a new connection,” said the storekeeper,

“But mother—we are obliged to ask for credit——”

“And that is what I have to do very frequently myself,” interposed Mr. Hargrew, still smiling. “What is it you wish, Miss Morse? Your credit is good here, I assure you. You have brought the very best of references—my daughter’s. Now, what is the first article?”

Jess could have cried with relief! Somehow she felt that Bobby and her father must know of her need, yet not a word or sign from either betrayed that fact. And one would scarcely suspect harum-scarum Bobby Hargrew of engineering such a delicate bit of business.

Nevertheless, Jess was vastly encouraged by this incident. She went into the meat shop and purchased a small piece of lamb for over Sunday and Mr. Heuffler did not ask her for his bill. She hoped that “something would turn up” and watched the mails very eagerly, hoping that a fugitive check might come. But the postman never came near the little cottage at the elbow in Whiffle Street, all that day.

CHAPTER VIII—THE RACE IS ON

“I doubt if we have any budding female Shakespeares among us, yet I realize that the youthful mind naturally slants towards tragedy and the redundant phrases of the Greek and Latin masters, as read in their translation; but let me advise all you young ladies who wish to compete for the prize, to select a simple subject and treat it simply.

“Have your play display human nature as you know it, and realism without morbidness.”

The girls of Central High who had heretofore excelled in composition naturally were looked upon as favorites in this race for dramatic honors. Among the Juniors, Laura Belding and Nellie Agnew always received high marks for such work. They possessed the knack of composition and were what Bobby Hargrew called “fluid writers.”

“If it was a jingle or limerick, I’d stand a chance,” sighed Bobby to herself. “But think of the sustained effort of writing a whole play! Gee! two hours and a half long. It would break my heart to sit still long enough to do it.”

Jess Morse had never tried to more than pass in English composition. For the very reason, perhaps, that she had seen the practical side of such a career at home, she had not, like so many girls of her age, contemplated seriously literary employment for herself.

Lily Pendleton was known to have once essayed an erotic novel, and had read a few chapters to some of her closer friends. Bobby said it should have been written on yellow paper with an asbestos pad under it to save scorching Miss Pendleton’s desk. Of course, Lily would attempt a play in the most romantic style.

The boys began to hatch practical jokes anent the play-writing before the week was out; and one afternoon Chet Belding appeared in a group of his sister’s friends, and with serious face declared he had with him the outline and introductory scene of Laura’s play, its caption being:

“The Poisoned Bathing-Suit; or, The Summer Boarder’s Revenge.”

Some of the girls—and not alone the Juniors like Laura, Nellie and Jess—were very serious about this matter of the play. Mrs. Kerrick’s prize spurred every girl who had the least ability in that direction to begin writing a dramatic piece. Some, of course, did not get far; but the main topic of discussion out of school hours among the girls of Central High was the play and the prize.

Jess talked it over with her mother, and Mrs. Morse grew highly excited.

“Why, Josephine, dear, if you could win that prize it would be splendid! Then you could have a new party dress—and a really nice one—and the furs I have been hoping to buy you for two seasons. Dear, dear! what a lot of things you really could get for that sum.”

“I guess it would help us out a whole lot,” admitted the girl “We need so many things——”

“Why, I shouldn’t allow you to use a cent of it for the household—or for me,” cried her mother. “No, indeed.”

“I haven’t won it yet,” sighed Jess. “But I guess if I did win it you’d have to take a part of it, Mother.”

“Nonsense, child!” cried Mrs. Morse. “We’ll have some checks in shortly. And we sha’n’t starve meanwhile. Now, let us look over this plot you have evolved and perhaps I can suggest some helpful points—and show you how to write brisk dialogue. That is something the editors always praise me for—although I have never dared try a play myself. It is so hard to get a hearing before a really responsible manager.”

Outside help for the girls was not debarred by the terms of the contest, so long as the main thread of plot in each play was original with the author, and she actually did the work. Jess listened to the practical suggestions of her mother in relation to her play; but all the time she had upon her mind, too, the domestic difficulties that seemed to have culminated just now in a single great billow of trouble.

No money had come in. She had been obliged to go once more to Mr. Hargrew for groceries, and to the meat store and to Mr. Vandergriff’s. Her mother could talk in her cheerful manner about what she could do with the two hundred dollar prize if she earned it. But Jess was very sure that she would not spend it for personal adornment—although no girl at Central High loved to be dressed in the mode more than Jess Morse.

“If such a darling thing should happen as my winning the prize, I’d put it all in the bank for a nest-egg,” she thought. “Then, when checks do not come in, we would not have to ask for credit. We’d pay up all debts and start square with the world. And then—and then I’d be perfectly happy!”

The first of the month arrived, and with it Mr. Chumley. Mrs. Morse was busy at her desk and said:

“Just tell him, Josephine, that we will have it shortly. He needn’t come again. I’ll let you take it around to his house to him when I get it.”

But this did not suit the old man, and he pushed his way, for once, into the presence of the literary lady.

“Now, see here! Now, see here!” he cackled. “This won’t do at all, Widder—this won’t do at all! I want my money, and I want it prompt. And if you can’t pay your present rent prompt, how do you expect to pay it next month, when you must find three dollars more? Now, tell me that, Ma’am?”

“Really, Mr. Chumley! You are too bad,” complained Mrs. Morse. “I am so hard at work. You quite drive the ideas out of my head. I—I don’t know what train of thought I was following.”

Mr. Chumley snorted. “You’d better be huntin’ the advertisement columns of a newspaper for a job, Widder,” he said. “Them ‘trains of thought’ of yours won’t never carry you nowhere. I gotter have my money. How are you going to get it?”

“I have never failed to pay you heretofore, have I?” asked the lady, bringing out her handkerchief now. “I think this is too bad——”

“But I want money!”

“And you shall have it, I have considerable owing to me—oh, yes! a good deal more than sufficient to pay your rent, Mr. Chumley. You will get it.”

That was a very unsatisfactory interview for the landlord, and particularly so for Mrs. Morse. She complained when he had gone to Jess:

“Now, my day is just spoiled. I’m all at loose ends. It will cost me a day’s work. Really, Josephine, if only people wouldn’t nag me so for money!”

And Jess strove to shield her all that she could from such interviews. Mrs. Morse needed to live alone in a world with her brain-children. Meanwhile her flesh-and-blood child had to fight her battles with the landlord and tradesmen.

It was amid such sordid troubles that Jess evolved the idea for her play. The butterfly is born of the ugly chrysalis; out of this unlovely environment grew a pretty, idyllic comedy which, although crude in spots, and lacking the professional touch which makes a dramatic piece “easy acting,” really showed such promise that Mrs. Morse acclaimed its value loudly.

“Oh, Mother! don’t praise me so much,” begged Jess. “The theme is good, I know. But it scares me. How can I ever dress it up to make it sound like a real play? It sounds so jerky and imperfect—that part that I have written, I mean.”

“There is something a dramatic critic told me once that may be true,” replied her mother. “It was that the piece which reads smoothly seldom acts well; whereas a play that ‘gets over the footlights’ usually reads poorly. You see, action cannot be read aloud; and it is the action that accompanies the words of a dramatic piece that makes those words tell.

“I am not sure that Mr. Sharp and his committee will consider your play the best written, from a literary standpoint; but I understand that they have invited Mr. Monterey, the manager of the Centerport Opera House, to read the plays, too. And you, Josephine, write for him; for they will depend upon his judgment in the choice of the acting qualities of the piece.”

This was good advice, as Jess very well knew. And she could barely keep her mind sufficiently upon her school work to pass the eagle scrutiny of Miss Grace G. Carrington, so wrapped up was she in the play. Not even to Laura did she confide any facts regarding the piece. Some of the girls openly discussed what they had done, and what they hoped; but Jess kept still.

Thursday came and in her mother’s morning mail was a letter with the card of the Centerport Courier in the corner.

“Now, what can that be?” drawled Mrs. Morse, when Jess eagerly brought it to her. “They buy no fugitive matter, and I haven’t sent them anything since having my interview with Mr. Prentice. I really would have been happier to see a letter like that from one of the New York magazines; it might have contained a check in that case,” and she slowly slit the envelope.

But Jess waited in the background with suppressed eagerness in her face and attitude. At once her thought had leaped to Mrs. Prentice. She had not told her mother a word about that lady’s visit on Friday evening, nor her errand to the house. But if Mrs. Prentice was really “the power behind the throne” in the Courier office, she might easily put some regular work in the way of Mrs. Morse.

“Listen to this, child!” exclaimed her mother, having glanced hastily through the letter. “Perhaps I had better take this—for a time, at least. I don’t like the idea of being tied down—it might interfere with my magazine work——”

“Oh, Mother!” cried Jess. “What is it?”

“Listen: Addressed to me, ‘Dear Madam:—Will reconsider your suggestion of covering Hill section for society news. Can afford at least five dollars’ worth of space through the week, and perhaps something extra on Sunday. Come and see me again. Respectfully, P. S. Prentice.’ Well!”

“Oh, Mother!” repeated Jess. “What a splendid chance!”

“Why, Josephine, not so very splendid,” said her mother, slowly. “He only guarantees me five dollars weekly. That is not much.”

“It will feed us—if we are careful,” gasped Jess.

“Goodness, Josephine! What a horribly practical child you are getting to be. I don’t know what the girls of to-day are coming to. Now, that would never have appealed to me when I was your age. I never knew how papa and mamma got food for us.”

Jess might have told her that conditions had not changed much since her girlhood!

“But five dollars regularly will help us a whole lot, Mother,” she urged.

“And it will necessitate my going out considerably—and appearing at receptions and places. Really—I have refused a number of invitations because of my wardrobe. My excuse of ‘work’ is not always strictly true,” sighed Mrs. Morse.

“But do, do try it, Mother!” cried Jess.

“Well,” said the lady, “it may do no harm. And it may be an opening for something better. But, really, nobody must know that I am a mere society reporter on the Centerport Courier.”

CHAPTER IX—A SKATING PARTY

“I am no friend to teachers, I admit,” confided Bobby to Dora and Dorothy. “Don’t you think they ought to be made to earn their money?”

“Any teacher who is so unfortunate as to have you in his, or her, class, is bound to earn all the salary coming to them,” declared Dorothy.

“Bad grammar—but you don’t know any better,” declared the harum-scarum. “You’re just as bad as Freddie Atkinson. Dimple asked him who compiled the dictionary, and Freddie said, ‘Daniel Webster.’

“‘No, sir! Noah!’ snapped Dimple.

“‘Oh, Professor!’ exclaimed Fred. ‘I thought Noah compiled the Ark?’”

As the girls were laughing over this story of Bobby Hargrew’s, Eve Sitz came up briskly. Laura and Jess were near at hand, and in a moment a group of the Juniors who always “trained together” were in animated discussion.

“Yes. It’s frozen hard. Otto was on it with a pair of horses and our pung,” declared Eve, who came in every morning from the country on the train, and whose father owned a big farm over beyond Robinson’s Woods.

“What’s frozen?” demanded Dora.

“Peveril Pond. It’s as smooth as glass. I want you to all come over on Saturday afternoon; we’ll have a lot of fun,” declared Eve.

“You’re always inviting us to the farm, Evangeline,” said Nellie Agnew; “I should think your father and mother would be tired of having us overrun the place.”

“Never you mind about them,” declared Evangeline, smiling. “They love to have young folks around. Now, remember! Saturday at noon the autos will start from the Beldings’ front door—if it doesn’t snow.”

“Oh, snow!” cried Bobby. “I hope not yet.”

    “‘Beautiful  snow!  he  may  sing  whom  it  suits—
    I  object  to  the  stuff,  ‘cause  it  soaks  through  my  boots!’”

“It’s too bad,” said Jess, “that Mrs. Kerrick didn’t offer a prize for verse. Bobby would win it, sure!”

“Never you mind,” said Bobby, with mock solemnity. “I may surprise you all yet. I am capable of turning out tragic stuff—you bet your boots!”

“Mercy, Bobby! how slangy you are getting,” murmured Nell Agnew, the doctor’s daughter.

“You think I cannot be serious?” demanded Bobby, very gravely. “Listen here. Here is what I call ‘The Lay of the Last Minorca’—not the ‘Last Minstrel!’

“‘She laid the still white form beside those that had gone before,’” quoth Bobby, in sepulchral tone.

“‘No sob, no sigh, forced its way from her heart, throbbing as though it would burst.

“‘Suddenly a cry broke the stillness of the place—a single heartbreaking shriek, which seemed to well up from her very soul, as she left the place:

“‘“Cut, cut, cut-ah-out!”

“‘She would lay another egg to-morrow.’”

“You ridiculous girl!” exclaimed Laura. “Aren’t you ever serious at all?”

“My light manner hides a breaking hear-r-r-t,” croaked Bobby. “You don’t know me, Laura, as I really are!”

“Don’t want to,” declared Laura Belding, briskly. “It must be awful to be a humorist. All right, Eve. We’ll come on Saturday. Chet will see Mr. Purcell about the big car. Lake Luna is frozen only at the edges, and is unsafe. But we will have a good time at Peveril Pond.”

Fortunately Mrs. Morse received payment for a story in a magazine that week or Jess would never have had the heart to join the skating party. But the sum realized was sufficient to settle with Mr. Closewick, pay the month’s rent of the cottage, and pay a part of each bill at Mr. Heuffler’s and Mr. Vandergriff’s shops.

These payments left Jess and her mother almost as badly off as they were before. And there was the new account started at Mr. Hargrew’s. But Chet Belding urged Jess very strongly to be his guest on Saturday, and there was really no reason why Jess should not go. Her mother had seen Mr. Prentice and begun furnishing items to the Courier from day to day; and the girl felt that, with care, they might be able to keep from getting so deeply into debt again.

No snow had fallen up to Saturday noon; but it was cold, and the clouds threatened a feathery fall before many hours. The young folk who gathered in the big hall of the Belding house thought little of the cold, however. There were warm robes and blankets in the Belding auto and in the sightseeing machine that Mr. Purcell had sent. Chet, in his bearskin coat, looked like the original owner of the garment—especially when he pulled the goggles down from the visor of his cap, and prepared to go out to the car.

“My dear fellow,” drawled Prettyman Sweet, the dandy of Central High, who was of the party, “you look howwidly fewocious, doncher know! I wouldn’t dwess in such execrable taste for any sum you could mention—no, sir!”

“Beauty’s only skin deep, they say, Pretty,” responded Chet “So, if you were flayed, you might look quite human yourself.”

“Purt” was gorgeous in a Canadian skating suit—or so the tailor who sold it to him had called it. It was all crimson and white, with a fur-edged velvet cap that it really took courage to wear, and fur-topped boots. And his gloves! they were marvels. One of them lying on the floor of the Beldings’ hall gave Topsy, Mrs. Belding’s pet terrier, such a fright that she pretty nearly barked her head off.

She made so much noise that Lance grabbed at her and tried to put her out of the room, Topsy still barking furiously.

“You look out!” drawled Bobby Hargrew. “One end of that dog bites, Lance!”

They turned Purt around and around to get the beauties of his costume at every angle. And they “rigged” him sorely. But the exquisite was used to it; he would only have felt badly if they had ignored his new “get-up.”

“It’s quite the thing, I assure you,” he declared. “And, weally, one should pay some attention to the styles. You fellows, weally, dress in execrable taste.”

When the party was complete they bundled into their wraps again and piled into the machines. Mrs. Belding had retired to her own room until the “devastation of the barbarians,” as she called it, was past; but Mammy Jinny straightened up the hall and dining room after the young folk with great cheerfulness.

“Yo’ know how yo’ was yo’self, Miss Annie, w’en yo’ was oberflowin’ wid de sperits ob youth,” she said, soothingly.

“I am sure I never overflowed quite so boisterously,” sighed Mrs. Belding.

“No. Yo’ warn’t one ob de oberflowin’ kind, Miss Annie,” admitted the old black woman. “But Mars’ Chet an’ Miss Laura, and dem friends ob theirs, sartain sure kin kick up a mighty combobberation—yaas’m!”

The wintry wind blew sharply past the crowd of Central High Juniors as the Belding auto and the bigger machine struck a fast pace when once they had cleared the city. There was lots of fun in the autos on the way to the Sitz farm; but they were all glad to tumble out there and crowd into the big kitchen “for a warm.”

The Swiss family were the most hospitable people in the world. Eve’s mother had a great heap of hot cakes ready for them, and there was coffee, too, to drive out the cold.

“We’re going to take Patrick down to the pond with us to keep up the fires while we’re skating,” Eve told Laura. Eve looked very pretty in her skating rig, and she was a splendid skater, too. “Father and Otto are somewhere down in the woods already. This cold weather coming on marks the time for hog killing, and some of the porkers have been running in the woods, fattening on the mast. There is an old mother hog that has gotten quite wild, and has a litter of young ones with her that are hard to catch. They may have to shoot her. So if you hear a gun go off, don’t be alarmed.”

The hired man, who stayed with the Sitzes all the year around, was a comical genius and the boys knew him well. As they started on the walk to the pond, Chet asked him:

“Do you skate yourself, Pat?”

“Sure, and it’s an illegant skater I used to be when I was young,” declared Pat; “barrin’ that I niver had thim murderin’ knives on me feet, but used ter skate on a bit of board down Donnegan’s Hill.”

“He’ll never own up that he doesn’t know a thing,” whispered Eve to Laura and Jess, as the boys laughed over this statement of the Irishman. “He was planting potatoes in the upper field, and all by himself, last spring, and a man drove along the road, and stopped and asked him what kind of potatoes they were.

“‘Sure, I know,’ says Patrick.

“‘Then what kind are they?’ repeated the neighbor.

“‘Sure, they’re raw ones, Mr. Hurley,’ says he, and Hurley came to the house roaring with laughter over it. Nothing feazes Patrick.”

The long, sloping hill, under the chestnuts and oaks, would have made a splendid coasting place; only there was no snow on the ground.

“But when the snow does come,” cried Dora Lockwood, “if the pond is still frozen over, won’t it be a great course?”

“The ice is all right now, at any rate,” Eve reassured them. “And there isn’t a spring hole in the entire pond, Otto says.”

Patrick had brought an axe and, with the help of some of the boys, soon had a big bonfire burning on the edge of the pond. Meanwhile the other boys helped the girls with their skate-straps, and then got on their own skates.

The ice hadn’t a scratch on it. It was like a great plate of glass, and so clear in places that they could see to the bottom of the pond—where the bottom was sandy.

All the young folk were soon on the ice, the boys starting a hockey game at the far end, and the girls circling around in pairs at the end nearest to the fire.

“That’s what Mrs. Case, our physical instructor, says we ought to learn,” said Laura, watching the boys.

“And it’s jolly good fun, too,” cried Bobby.

“But suppose you turned your ankle, or fell down and tore your dress?” suggested Nellie. “I believe hockey on the ice is too rough.”

“No game needs to be rough,” declared Laura. “That isn’t the spirit of athletics. Didn’t we learn how to play basketball without being rough?”

“Even Hessie Grimes learned that,” chuckled Bobby.

At that moment a gun was fired back in the thicker woods, and then out of the brush the girls saw an animal charging directly for the pond. Patrick saw it, too, and leaped up from before the fire and ran toward the beast.

“It’s a big hog!” cried Bobby.

“That’s the one they want to catch,” said Eve. “She is ugly, too, I believe.” Then she raised her voice in warning to Patrick; “Look out, Patrick! She is real cross.”

“Faith!” returned the Irishman, half squatting down in the path of the charging sow. “It’s not afraid I be of the likes of a pig. ’Tis too many of their tails I’ve twisted in ould Ireland, to run from wan in Ameriky——”

Just then the animal spied him and went for Patrick, full tilt. There wasn’t time for the Irishman to dodge; but he did spread his legs, and the angry mother-hog ran between them.

CHAPTER X—THE MID-TERM EXAMINATION

True to his instinct, the dog attempted to seize the hog by the ear, but miscalculated and caught Patrick by the calf of the leg!

“Moses and all the children of Israel!” bawled the Irishman. “’Tis not fair to set two bastes onto wan! Call off yer dawg, Otto, or it’s the death of him I’ll be when I git rid of the hog.”

But just then the poor hog got rid of him. She lay down and Patrick tumbled off, kicking at the dog. Dandy seemed much surprised to discover that he had locked his teeth on the wrong individual!

The boys were convulsed with laughter; but the girls were afraid that the Irishman had been seriously hurt. And, from the squealing of the hog, they were positive that she was suffering.

However, Mr. Sitz and Otto appeared, and tied the legs of the struggling beast, and so bore her away. They had already trapped her litter of young ones, and Patrick limped after his master and Otto, vowing vengeance against both the hog and the dog.

So the boys took turns in keeping up the fire on the shore, for although it was a clear day, the wind continued cold and blew hard. They were all glad to hover around the blaze, now and then; and especially so when they ate their luncheons.

Eve had prepared a great can of chocolate and the girls had all brought well-filled lunch boxes. Bobby was hovering about Laura’s as soon as it was opened.

“Mammy Jinny’s made you something nice, I know,” she said. “Dear me, I’m so hungry! I wish I was like the Mississippi River.”

“What’s that for?” demanded Prettyman Sweet, who overheard her. “Like the Mississippi? Fawncy!”

“Then I’d have three mouths,” exclaimed Bobby, immediately filling the mouth she did possess.

“My word! that wouldn’t be so bad an idea, would it?” proclaimed Purt, who was a good deal of a gourmand himself.

“I don’t think much of this jam pie,” complained Chet, holding up a wedge that he had taken from his sister’s basket.

“That’s not jam pie!” exclaimed Laura. “Whoever heard of jam pie?”

“Yep. This is it,” declared Chet. “The crusts are jammed right together. There ain’t enough filling.”

The wind increased toward the end of the day and it was hard to skate against it; but the young folk had a lot of fun sailing down the length of the pond with their coats spread for sails.

“That was a great scheme you suggested about the kite the other day, Laura,” declared Lance Darby. “It was as good as an aeroplane.”

“What would be the matter with hitching the kite to our scooter?” suggested Chet, who overheard him.

The two chums owned a small iceboat which went, on Lake Luna, by the name of “scooter.”

“Say, old man! I’ve got a better scheme than that!” cried Lance, suddenly.

“What say?”

“Let’s combine a flying machine with an iceboat and beat out everybody on the lake this winter!”

“Wow!” shouted his chum. “Now, you’ve been skating with Mother Wit and have caught her inventive genius—it’s contagious. Gee! what an idea!”

“That’s all right. Wait till you hear my scheme,” said Lance, wagging his head.

“It ought to work fine,” said Bobby Hargrew, with serious face. “All you will have to do when you are sailing along the ice and come to open water will be to turn a switch and jump right into the air. Save getting your feet wet.”

“Laugh all you want to,” said Lance, threateningly. “When we get it done you girls will be glad enough to ride in it.”

“Not I!” cried Nellie Agnew. “I wouldn’t ride on your old scooter as it is. And to combine a flying machine and iceboat—whew! I guess not.”

The boys became enthusiastic, however, and they talked about it all the way home. Lance, however, kept the important idea regarding the new invention for Chet Belding’s private ear.

Jess Morse enjoyed the outing that Saturday, as she always enjoyed such fun when with the Beldings; but, after all her mind was on her play. She almost lived that play nowadays!

And, to tell the truth, she began to neglect some of her studies in her concentration of mind upon “The Spring Road.” Her mother praised it warmly.

“To think that I should have a daughter who may turn out to be a real genius!” cried Mrs. Morse. “Although it is so hard to get a play accepted by a first-class producer.”

“No. I don’t want to be a genius,” said Jess shaking her head. “But I do want awfully to win that prize.”

“Such a sordid child,” said her mother, playfully. “I cannot imagine one’s putting such emphasis on mere money. It isn’t genius, after all, I fear. Our friends would call you eminently practical, I suppose,” and the irresponsible lady sighed.

But if Jess had no impractical thoughts regarding why she wished to win the prize, she made the mistake, just the same, of letting Miss Carrington catch her two or three times in recitation hour. Gee Gee was down on her like a hawk.

“Miss Morse, what does this mean?” demanded the stern teacher, eyeing Jess with particular grimness through her thick spectacles.

She had called the culprit to her desk just before the noon recess and now showed her the enormity of her offenses.

“You are falling back. There is something on your mind beside your textbooks, that is very sure, Miss Morse. I cannot lay it to athletics at present, I suppose, for there seems to be a slight let-up in the activities of you young ladies in that direction,” and she smiled her very scornfullest smile. Miss Carrington abhorred athletics.

“But we have another matter interfering with the placid current of our school life. Are you, Miss Morse, one of the young ladies who are attempting to write a play?”

“Ye—yes, ma’am,” stammered Jess, blushing to her ears.

“Ah! so I thought. I believe I can pick out all these playwrights by a reference to their recitation papers. And this afternoon comes our mid-term examination. Let me tell you, Miss Morse, that you must do better this afternoon, or I shall take your case up with Mr. Sharp.”

She was folding and tying with a narrow ribbon some papers as she spoke, and her eyes snapped behind her glasses.

“These are the questions in my hands now, Miss Morse,” said Gee. “And let me tell you, they are searching ones. Be prepared, Miss—be prepared!”

And she popped them into the top drawer on the right-hand side of her desk. But before she could shut down the roll top and so lock the desk, Miss Gould appeared at the door of the room and beckoned to Miss Carrington. The latter rose hurriedly and departed, leaving her desk open. And likewise leaving Jess Morse, her hungry eyes fixed upon that drawer in which the examination questions lay!

Just a peep at those papers might have helped Jess a whole lot in the coming hour of trial.

CHAPTER XI—MISSING

“What’s the matter, Jess?” asked Laura, coming up to her and squeezing her arm. “Something is troubling you, honey.”

“And it will trouble you after recess,” replied Jess, mournfully.

“The old exams?”

“Uh-huh!”

“Afraid, are you?” laughed Mother Wit.

“I’m just scared to death. And Gee Gee knows I’m not prepared and she will be down on me like a hawk.”

“Maybe not.”

“She knows I am weak. She just told me so, and she showed me the papers and said there were awfully hard questions in them. She just delights in catching us girls. And she says all of us who are trying for the prize are neglecting our regular work.”

“I expect we are, Jess,” admitted Laura. “Oh, dear! it’s not easy to write a play, is it?”

“I don’t know,” said Jess, hesitatingly. “I’m not sure that I am writing a regular play. But I’m writing something!”

“What does your mother say about it?”

“Oh, of course she praises it. She would.”

“I bet you win the prize, Jess!” exclaimed Laura.

“No such luck. And, anyway, I will take no prize this afternoon. Gee Gee threatens to take my standing up with Mr. Sharp if I don’t do well, too.”

“Oh, don’t worry, dear. Perhaps you will come out all right.”

Bobby came swinging along and bumped into them. “Oh, hullo!” exclaimed she. “Say! how do you pronounce ‘s-t-i-n-g-y’? Heh?”

“Man or wasp?” returned Mother Wit, quickly.

Jess laughed. “You can’t catch Laura with your stale jokes, Bobby,” she gibed.

“That’s all right; I asked for information. But you girls don’t know anything. You’re writing plays. That’s enough to give you softening of the brain. The folks that know it all are the squabs,” chuckled Bobby, referring to the freshman class. “What do you suppose one of them sprang this morning?”

“I haven’t the least idea,” spoke Laura.

“Why, she was asked to define the difference between instinct and intelligence, and she said: ‘Instinct knows everything needed without learning it; but human beings have reason, so we have to study ourselves half blind to keep from being perfect fools!’ Now, what do you know about that?”

“I believe that child was right,” sighed Jess. “If I only had instinct I wouldn’t have to worry about the questions Gee Gee is going to give us this afternoon.”

“Oh, say not so!” gasped Bobby, rolling her eyes and putting up both hands. “I am trying to forget about those exams——There’s the bell! Back to the mines!” she groaned, and rushed to take her place in the line.

The Junior class crowded into Miss Carrington’s room and took their seats. The examination covered several of the more important studies. The teacher took her place, adjusted the thick glasses she always wore, and looked sternly over the room.

“Young ladies,” she said, in her most severe manner, “I hope you are all prepared for the review. But I doubt it—I seriously doubt it. Some of you have been falling behind of late in a most astonishing manner, and I fear for your standing—I fear for it.”

This manner of approaching the exam, was, of course, very soothing to the nervous girls; but it was Gee Gee’s way and they should all have been used to it by this time. She had opened the drawer of her desk—the top right-hand drawer—and was fumbling in it.

Pretty soon she gave her entire attention to sorting the papers in this drawer, which seemed to be pretty full. As the moments passed, her manner betrayed the fact that the teacher was much disturbed.

“Oh! I hope she’s lost ’em!” exclaimed the wicked Bobby Hargrew.

“I don’t,” returned the girl she spoke to. “We’d suffer for it.”

“Well, I got my fingers crossed!” chuckled Bobby. “She can’t accuse me. I wasn’t near her old desk.”

“Wasn’t it locked?” whispered another of the waiting girls.

Miss Carrington heard the bustle in the class, so she sat up and looked out over the room with asperity.

“I want to know what this means, girls,” she said, snappily. “My desk was left open by chance while I was out of the room for perhaps ten minutes. The examination papers were in this drawer. Now I cannot find them. Has somebody done this for a joke?” and she looked hard in Bobby’s direction.

“Look out, Bob,” warned one of her mates; “crossing your fingers isn’t going to save you.”

But suddenly, even while she was speaking, Miss Carrington seemed to be stabbed by a thought. She started to her feet and turned her gaze upon the part of the room in which Josephine Morse sat. And Jess’s face was aflame!

“Miss Morse!”

Gee Gee’s voice was never of a pleasing quality. Now it startled every girl in the room. Jess slowly arose, and she clung to the corner of her desk a moment for support.

“Do you remember seeing me put those question papers into this drawer? Do you?” demanded the teacher.

“Ye—yes, ma’am,” replied Jess.

“You were standing right here at my desk?”

Jess nodded, while the whole class watched her now paling face. Many of the girls looked amazed; some few looked angry. Laura Belding’s eyes fairly blazed and she half rose from her seat.

“Sit down, young ladies!” commanded Miss Carrington, who was quick to see these suggestive actions on the part of the class. “Come here to me, Miss Morse.”

Jess walked up the aisle. After that first moment her strength came back and she held her head up and stared straight into the face of the teacher. The tears that had sprung to her eyes she winked back.

“I had called you to my desk, Miss Morse,” said Gee Gee, in a low voice, and staring hard at the girl, “and had pointed out to you that this particular examination would be a trying one. Is that not a fact?”

“Yes, ma’am,” admitted Jess.

“Miss Gould called me and I hastily thrust the papers, which I particularly told you were the question papers, into this drawer. Did I not?”

“You did.”

“And then I hurried out of the room without locking the drawer—without pulling down the roll top of the desk, indeed. Is that not so, Miss Morse?”

“It is,” said Jess, getting better control of her voice now.

“And you were left standing here. The other girls were gone. Now, Miss Morse, I freely admit that I am culpable in leaving such important papers in the way. I should have locked them up. I presume the temptation was great——”

“I beg your pardon, Miss Carrington!” exclaimed the girl, more indignant than frightened now. “You are accusing me without reason. I would not do such a thing——”

“Not ordinarily, perhaps,” interposed Miss Carrington. “But it all came to you in a moment, I presume. And you did not have time to put them back.”

This she had said in a low voice, so that nobody but Jess heard her. But the girl’s voice rose higher as she grew hysterical.

“Miss Carrington, you are unfair! I never touched them!”

“You must admit, Miss Morse, that circumstances are very much against you,” declared the teacher.

“I admit nothing of the kind. A dozen people might have been in the room while you were out and the desk was open. Ten minutes is a long time.”

“You seem to have thought out your defense very well, Miss Morse,” said Gee Gee, sternly. “But it will not do. It is too serious a matter to overlook. I shall send for Mr. Sharp,” and she touched the button which rang the bell in the principal’s office.

CHAPTER XII—COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE

Bobby wickedly whispered to her neighbor that she hoped the papers wouldn’t ever be found. But that would not help Jess Morse out of trouble.

To Jess herself, hiding her face behind an open book, the printed page of which was a mere blur before her eyes, it seemed as though this trouble would overwhelm her. It was worse than the poverty she and her mother had to face. It was worse than having no party dress fit to be seen in. It was worse than being refused credit at Mr. Closewick’s grocery store. It was worse than having old Mr. Chumley hound them for the rent

Reviewing the whole affair more calmly, Jess could understand that Miss Carrington would consider her guilty—if she could bring herself to think any girl of Central High would do such a thing.

Jess sat there, dumb, unable to work, unable to concentrate her mind on anything but the horribly unjust accusation of her teacher. How she disliked Gee Gee!

The other girls were not particularly devoted to the task set them for the moment, either. Laura did not sit very near her chum in this room. She asked permission to speak with Jess and Miss Carrington said:

“No, Miss Belding; sit down!” and she said it in her very grimmest way. Usually the teacher was very lenient with Mother Wit, for of all her pupils Laura gave her the least trouble.

A feeling of expectancy controlled the whole roomful of girls. It came to a crisis—every girl jumped!—when the door opened and Mr. Sharp walked in.

The principal of Central High seldom troubled the girls’ class rooms with his presence. When he addressed the young ladies it was usually en masse. He trusted Miss Carrington, almost entirely, in the management of the girls.

His rosy cheeks shone and his eyes twinkled through his glasses as he walked quickly to the platform and sat down beside Gee Gee at her table, which faced the girls, whereas her roll-top desk was at the rear of the platform, against the wall of the room.

Principal and teacher talked in low voices for some moments. Mr. Sharp cast no confusing glances about the room. He ignored the girls, as though his entire business was with their teacher.

At length he looked around, smiling as usual, Mr. Sharp was a pleasant and fair-minded man and the girls all liked him. He had their undivided attention in a moment, without the rapping of Miss Carrington’s hard knuckle on the table top. Bobby said that that knuckle of Gee Gee’s middle finger had been abnormally developed by continued bringing the class to order.

“Young ladies!” said Gee Gee, snappily. “Mr. Sharp will speak to you.”

The principal looked just a little annoyed—just a little; and for only the moment while he was rising to speak. He never liked to hear his pupils treated like culprits. He usually treated them at assembly with elaborate politeness if he had to criticise, and with perfect good-fellowship if praise was in order. This little scene staged by Miss Carrington grated on him.

“Our good Miss Carrington,” said he, softly, “has sustained a loss. Important papers have been mislaid, we will say.”

He raised his hand quickly when Miss Carrington would have spoken, and she was wise enough to let him go on in his own way.

“Now, the question is: How have the papers been lost, and where are they at the present moment? It is a problem—in deduction, we will say. We must all partake of the character of some famous detective. It used to be a rule in our family when I was a boy that, if a thing were lost, it was wisest to look for it in the most unlikely places first. I can remember once, when father lost a horse, that mother insisted in shaking out all the hens’ nests and giving them new nests. But father never did find that horse.”

The girls had begun to smile now; and some of them giggled. Miss Carrington looked as she usually did when Mr. Sharp joked—it pained her and set her teeth on edge. Bobby declared she looked as though she had bitten into a green persimmon.

“Joking aside, however,” continued the principal. “This loss is a serious matter. Suppose you young ladies suggest how the question papers to be used in this mid-term examination have been whisked out of this drawer of Miss Carrington’s desk, and hidden elsewhere? Can it be possible that it is the prank of a pixy? Of course, all of you young ladies are too serious-minded to do such a thing yourselves.”

There was a general laugh, then, and the strain of the last few minutes began to be relieved. Somehow, even Jess Morse felt better.

“To suggest that anybody in this class—the Junior class of Central High—would deliberately misappropriate these questions is beyond imagination,” declared Mr. Sharp, with sudden gravity. “It is a mistake. The mistake is explainable. Has anyone a suggestion to make?”

It was Laura Belding who broke the silence. She asked her question very modestly, but her cheeks were flushed, and she was evidently indignant.

“Is—is it positive that the papers were put in that top drawer that Miss Carrington now has open?”

“Ask Miss Morse!” snapped the teacher, before Mr. Sharp could reply.

“We will. Nothing like corroboration,” said the principal, with a bow and smile. “Miss Morse?”

“Yes, sir,” said Jess, in a low voice, rising. “I saw her put them there. She tied them into a bundle by themselves.”

“You are observant, Miss Morse,” said the principal, smiling again. “Thank you. Now, Miss Belding?” for Laura was still standing.

“I notice that the drawer is very full,” said Laura, quietly. “May I come upon the platform and look at it?”

“Certainly,” responded Mr. Sharp; but Miss Carrington flushed again, and exclaimed:

“I have searched that drawer thoroughly. The papers are not there.”

Again Mr. Sharp made a little deprecatory gesture, “Come forward, Miss Belding,” he said.

Mother Wit gave her chum a single reassuring glance. Somehow, without reason, that look comforted Jess. She still stood beside her desk, too anxious to sit down again, while Laura walked quietly forward.

“That drawer is very full, Mr. Sharp,” she said, composedly enough. “May I take it out?”

“Oh, I’ve had it out and felt behind it,” urged Miss Carrington, all of a flutter now.

“Maybe Miss Belding can show us something we did not know,” said the principal, in his bantering way. It had been he who gave Laura her nickname, and he thought a great deal of the girl. He knew that she had some serious intention or she would not have come forward.

Laura pulled out the over-full drawer and set it down upon the carpet.

“Oh, it isn’t there,” said Miss Carrington. “The packet was tied with a mauve ribbon—a narrow ribbon——”

Laura pulled out the next drawer.

“Oh, that’s quite useless,” exclaimed the lady teacher. “And to have everything disarranged in this way——”

“We must give the counsel for the defense every opportunity, Miss Carrington,” said the principal softly.

Laura drew out the third drawer—just glancing at the top layer of papers—and then the fourth and last. No bundle tied with a mauve ribbon appeared.

“Not there!” exclaimed Gee Gee, and was there a spice of satisfaction in her voice?